Artist · chart history

Tin Machine

Band United Kingdom Active 1988–1992

Tin Machine formed in 1988 in the United Kingdom and was active until 1992. Tin Machine has 18 chart appearances on 10 radio countdowns from 4 stations on RockLists, spanning 1989–2005. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Baby Universal”, which appears on 9 lists with a best position of #89. The station that charted Tin Machine most often is CD101 (Columbus, OH), with 15 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 1991.

18appearances

10countdowns

4songs charted

4stations

0#1 finishes

1989–2005years

Tin Machine was David Bowie's great detour. In 1988 he put his solo career aside and joined a four-piece rock band, singing and playing saxophone and guitar alongside guitarist Reeves Gabrels and the Sales brothers, Tony on bass and Hunt on drums, both of them singing too. The Sales brothers went way back with Bowie, having played with him and Iggy Pop on the 1977 tour for The Idiot. Kevin Armstrong added guitar and keyboards on both studio albums.

The idea, as Bowie put it, was to play the kind of music they liked listening to and to recharge himself as an artist, and the result was loud, raw, deliberately rough-edged hard rock, with Gabrels' guitar squalling all over it. Hunt Sales reckoned the clanging name summed up the sound. Tin Machine, in 1989, came with "Under the God", and Tin Machine II in 1991 was a little looser, with "Baby Universal", "One Shot" and "Goodbye Mr. Ed".

The live album Tin Machine Live: Oy Vey, Baby closed the book in 1992, and Bowie picked up where he had left off as a solo act. Their albums had racked up two million in sales by 2012, and Bowie himself credited Tin Machine with bringing his career back to life.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.

Songs by Tin Machine on radio countdowns

#	Song	Strength	Lists	Best	#1s	Peak year
1	Baby Universal	233	9	#89	–	1991
2	One Shot	53	4	#1730	–	–
3	Goodbye Mr. Ed	43	4	#1778	–	–
4	Under the God	5	1	#103	–	1989

Albums with charting songs

Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.

Year-end chart timeline

Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.

89 91

Every countdown appearance

Year	#	Song	Countdown
2005	1379	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2006 Songs of All-Time (December 2005)
2004	1378	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2005 Songs of All-Time (December 2004)
2003	1378	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2004 Songs of All-Time (December 2003)
2002	1392	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2003 Songs of All-Time (December 2002)
2002	1730	One Shot	CD101 Top 2003 Songs of All-Time (December 2002)
2002	1778	Goodbye Mr. Ed	CD101 Top 2003 Songs of All-Time (December 2002)
2001	1393	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2002 Songs of All-Time (December 2001)
2001	1740	One Shot	CD101 Top 2002 Songs of All-Time (December 2001)
2001	1790	Goodbye Mr. Ed	CD101 Top 2002 Songs of All-Time (December 2001)
2000	1393	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2001 Songs of All-Time (December 2000)
2000	1740	One Shot	CD101 Top 2001 Songs of All-Time (December 2000)
2000	1790	Goodbye Mr. Ed	CD101 Top 2001 Songs of All-Time (December 2000)
1999	1393	Baby Universal	CD101 Top 2000 Songs of All-Time (December 1999)
1999	1740	One Shot	CD101 Top 2000 Songs of All-Time (December 1999)
1999	1789	Goodbye Mr. Ed	CD101 Top 2000 Songs of All-Time (December 1999)
1991	91	Baby Universal	91X Top 91 Songs of 1991
1991	89	Baby Universal	Live 105 Top 105.3 Songs of 1991
1989	103	Under the God	KROQ Top 106.7 Songs of 1989

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